


It's the Thought That Counts

by Liadt



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Friendship, Gen, Humour, Meat eating, Pre-Relationship, as shippy as canon, he's hopeful she's oblivious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-31
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-01 04:59:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2760521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liadt/pseuds/Liadt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On entering the TARDIS, Clara finds an unusual assortment of items in the console room.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's the Thought That Counts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [paynesgrey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/paynesgrey/gifts).



Clara stepped into the TARDIS. Today was one of those days when she took a trip away with the Doctor. Normally she would have gone to find out where the Doctor was in the TARDIS, but she halted in the middle of the console room floor instead. In front of her, cooking on a spit roast was a large animal. Next to the barbeque, on a long, polished table made out of a single log was a gleaming knife, an ornately carved bow, plus arrows and some very nice wooden bowls. 

“Ah, Clara,” barked the Doctor, from over by the blackboard. He leapt down the stairs to her and did a little spin before reaching Clara. He appeared very pleased with himself.

Clara raised her eyebrows. “Hello Doctor. I know I said I wanted a break from perilous adventures, but I didn’t expect you to go off on your own and then bring things back, from the Captain Caveman era, to do a show and tell for me instead.”

“It’s not a show and tell,” said the Doctor.

“You recall me saying how much I enjoyed a takeaway from ‘The Caliph’s Kingdom’ and you’ve decided to top it by getting a number nine special from the planet Zog?”

“No, they eat mashed birds nest’s on Zog. Does this make things clearer?” asked the Doctor. He brought out a very short, revealing dress, made out of leather patches.

“Um, I don’t think you’ve a Betty Rubble fantasy you want me to act out, so I can only imagine I shouldn’t have left you watching all those eco-craft TV shows on your own, when I had to go and sort out a parent teacher dispute. At least you didn’t make the tie-dyed pants. You didn’t did you?”

“What do you take me for? Why would anyone buy someone else underwear? You’ve obviously become so overworked marking homework you’ve forgotten it’s your birthday!”

“Er, it isn’t, not for another three months,” pointed out Clara.

“I wrote it on the board so I wouldn’t forget. It must have got tangled up in an equation I was working out. I’ll put it in the five hundred year diary later.”

“I’m impressed with all the trouble you’ve gone to, but I don’t understand your choice of gifts.”

“Remember last year? I bought you a phangeoab-drangdont machine. Your mouth turned up at the corners and you said positive things, but it didn’t match what your eyes expressed. If I had been given a phangeoab-drangdont machine I would have been ecstatic. I realised my mistake later. How could I possibly expect you to like what I like; we’re completely different. I’m a Time Lord and you’re a human female. I was determined to get it right this time and I acquired some women’s magazines to research what women like.” The Doctor pointed at a bunch periodicals scattered across the floor.

“You’ve been reading some weird women’s magazines if they suggested weaponry as the perfect present.” Clara went to inspect them. “Actually, I suspected wrongly, these are proper, ordinary women’s magazines.”

“I did start reading them, but I was distracted by a fascinating, unfinished physics theory, which I simply had to work out to my satisfaction.”

“I’m glad you were distracted; the blouses in the pages you’ve left open aren’t to my taste at all.”

“Oh, they’re not for you, they’re for me. I did get as far as reading that if you leave magazines open at the right page it gives your partner hints of what to buy them.”

“Riiight. That’s not me though,” said Clara.

“Of course not, we’ve had that discussion. After I had to dispose of the physics theory for being fundamentally flawed, I asked Leela to assist me in getting the right gifts. She used to travel with me when I had a different face. You should have seen me: my hair was as if my eyebrows had gone on the rampage. The eyes were excellent for staring with - I had no complaints there. She left me to marry a Time Lord, you know. I thought Leela would know what to get you for your birthday. You’re both the same: you wear short dresses,-”

Clara bit back a comment about a giant loincloth not being the same as a comparatively conservative shift dress. She presumed the Doctor would tell her she was talking nonsense, after getting a tape measure out to prove both items of clothing fell to the same spot on her thigh. 

“- come from primitive societies, have a similar amount of arms and legs and brown hair. Although looking at your hair you’ll soon be as grey as me.”

“I am not going grey!” protested Clara.

The Doctor leaned in closer to Clara. “My mistake, those aren’t white hairs, they’re flakes of dandruff. I’d get some medicated shampoo if I were you.”

“Doctor!”

“As your friend, I wouldn’t want you to walk past an open window at school and hear the other teachers discussing the state of your scalp negatively.”

“I suppose it’s the thought that counts,” muttered Clara. “Anyway, whatever’s on the barbeque smells delicious. I’ll carve shall I?” Clara took the knife and used it to slice meat off the roasting beast. As she was building up a stack of meat in one of the wooden bowls, a shiny object fell out of the carcass. Clara picked up the orb. “Oh Doctor, it’s beautiful! I’ve never seen a lovelier jewel. The play of colours across the surface is amazing. Hiding the best present until last is ever so clever and come to think of it very gross.” Clara wiped the jewel with her sleeve. “Can I keep it or do you want to take it back and give it to me, when it’s my birthday, in a gift bag with a bow?” 

Clara couldn’t contain her joy over her present: she bounded up to the Doctor and embraced him. She felt him tense under her arms. “That’s more hug than you want isn’t it?” she whispered in the Doctor’s ear and let him go.

“Wrapping paper is overrated. How about we visit Andopyra? The coats of the gliding squirrels there have the most wonderful pattern variations. They were hunted to extinction because their pelts were used as wrapping paper.” The Doctor rubbed his hands together. He was relieved Clara’s hug had been very brief. He tolerated it because she was his special friend and it made her happy. Because her eyes matched her beaming smile, which made him happy in return, he completely forgot to point out it wasn’t a jewel she‘d found, but a gallstone commonly found in this species’ bile duct.

“If I can save anyone else, including animals, from gift wrap hell I’m in,” said Clara, playing with the stone to see how it caught the light at different angles.

Clara did seem awfully pleased with the stone and the Doctor decided he could tolerate being hugged by Clara today. “You have my permission to embrace me for as long as you want,” announced the Doctor, grandly. I sound like a Lord talking down to one of their serfs, just when I wanted to give the right impression, he thought, cursing himself.

“Will do,” said Clara, still staring deeply into the depths of the stone.

A smile tugged at the Doctor’s mouth. A distracted Clara was preferable to one he had put off. He surreptitiously toed one of the open magazines nearer to Clara, perhaps the stone could hypnotise her into taking a hint.


End file.
